David Letterman has been sitting atop the late night Nielsen ratings since Jay Leno went prime time and Conan O’Brien took over the Tonight Show, a rare and heady experience for Dirty Dave which should end soon after Leno gets re-entrenched at 11:30.Â

It’s all good though.Â Â Conan is crying all the way to the bank with hisÂ wallet stuffed with $45 million NBC had to pay him and Dave is scaredÂ out of his worldwide pantsÂ that he will again become second fiddle to Leno’s Tonight show, a slot he’s been salivating for since Johnny Carson left the scene.

To demonstrate once again his lack of class and professionalism, Letterman has been relentlessly ripping Leno ever since news of the NBC shakeup became public, mimicking Leno’s voice, mocking his failed 10 pm “variety show,” blaming him for the fiasco, suggesting he stole his material. Â

Leno finallyÂ retaliatedÂ with an allusion to Letterman’s confessed infidelities:Â “You know the best way to get Letterman to ignore you?Â Marry him.Â He will not bother you.Â He won’t look you in the eye:” http://bit.ly/8qr6H0Â Â Â Â

IfÂ Leno thinks that will bother Letterman he has another think coming.Â Â

Dave shacked up with his long time live-in, Regina Lasko,Â for years before marrying her last year when their son Harry was five–and he promptly began screwing around withÂ various LateÂ Show bimbos.

PersonalÂ criticism will get Jay nowhere with a guy without a conscience or a modicum of decency.Â Letterman is simply a nasty excuse for a human being.Â His aged Indiana mother is fair game for his jibes.

LettermanÂ demonstratedÂ his flawedÂ character last summer not only with his nasty cracks about Sarah Palin as a slutty stewardess but by attacking her 14 year oldÂ daughter Willow.Â He quipped thatÂ she was doing the nasty with A-Rod in the right field stands of Yankee Stadium when Palin and Willow attended a game.Â

Letterman thrives onÂ slashing, mean-spirited sarcasm, selective ridicule aimed only at Republicans.Â Democrat Bob Beckel has even commented that had he referred to Democrats as he did to the Palins he would be thrownÂ off the air before his worldwide pants hit the floor.

Widely chastised forÂ acting like Holden Caulfield’sÂ ”dirty old man with a snot on his collar” with hisÂ slurs onÂ the Palins, Dirty Dave subsequentlyÂ semi-apologized on-air with all the lack of sincerity one would expect from him.

Women’s rights groups, including NOW, didn’t bat an organizationalÂ eye at his misogynism or join the protests against him since Palin was just a Republican.Â Â Â

SoÂ Dirty Dave felt he was in the clear and free to get even with Governor Palin for making such a fuss over his derogatory remarks.Â HeÂ went on a months-long tear of sneering jokes about the Palins and theÂ ineffectual “Fire Letterman” campaign.

His sneering was later accompanied by a newÂ show feature, “Things More Fun Than Reading Sarah Palin’s Book,” riotously amusing film clipsÂ showing exploding heads, etc.Â Â

That routine fizzled when Going RogueÂ soared to the best-seller listÂ and millions apparently opted to get more fun by reading the bookÂ rather than having their heads explode.Â

At a loss for new Republicans to rip, Letterman and his writers have now hit paydirt with Scott Brown, the newly elected senator from the commonwealth of Massachusetts.

Little was madeÂ by Brown’s opponent ofÂ his youthful indiscretionÂ of posingÂ in the altogether for Cosmo thirty years ago.Â For Dirty Dave, it was funny red meat.

Democrat Barney Frank’s homosexual affair with a perv who had used Barney’s basement as a gay whorehouse wasn’t funny.Â Â Â Drunken Democrat Max Baucus blathering on the floor of the United Statres Senate didn’t qualify for yuks.Â Â Democrat Harry Reid’s racist reference to Obama as a “light-skinned Negro” was even less humorous than foot-in-mouth Joe Biden calling Obama a “clean and articulate” Black man.

And certainly nothing stupid andÂ inane uttered by the Democratic Obamassiah made the comic grade for Letterman and his writers.

However, a 30 year old mag photo of a Republican, supplemented by an unrelated film clip of nudie beachgoers, identified by Letterman as Brown and his wife, were absolutely hilarious to Dave.

Undoubtedly we’ll be seeing that picture and film clip frequently on the Late Show.Â

Thursday night Letterman was soÂ absolutely enthralled by that photo ofÂ a naked young man that he couldn’t take his eyes off it, giving rise to the possibility that all those staffers he took up to his boudoir at the Ed Sullivan Theater weren’t all lady friends.

Personally, I don’t give a flying fig about the Leno-Letterman-Conan-NBC controversy, although it’s very obvious that Dave’s lingeringÂ bitterness over his firing by NBC years ago and his palpable hatred for Jay bleeds any humor from his witticisms.

I’m aware that celebrity hanky panky is far more common than celebs attending church servicesÂ and this is not a condemnation of the obvious.Â

However, when celebs attack, when hypocrites such as Dave Letterman attack their fellow comedians, they had betterÂ be leadingÂ pristine lives or else be prepared for appropriate retaliations that could cut to the quick unless they are quick enough to repel them.

Of course, Dirty Dave could always apologize to Leno and thereby conclude the late night wars.Â Of course, Henny Penny’s sky could always fall andÂ render any apologies redundant.Â